8 Family Friendly Activities to Make Your Child’s Summer Memorable

When your child returns to preschool in the fall, what stories will they tell about their summer? For many parents, the pressure to make each summer memorable for their young ones can be overwhelming. As an early education center, we’ve researched countless family-friendly activities parents can use during the summer to keep their child entertained and learning. Here are a few fun summer activities you can do with your child that won’t overwhelm you or be forgotten the very next day:

• Create a backyard obstacle course
• Plant a garden
• Hold a scavenger hunt
• Make food together
• Create fun crafts
• Go camping
• Make chores fun
• Go to summer camp

Ready to make this the summer your child will never forget? Then keep reading to learn how to put on these fun summer activities for your little one.

Create a Backyard Obstacle Course

Summer is the perfect time to create outdoor activities for preschoolers. The weather is nice and warm, and you can easily create a fun space where your child can run and play in your own backyard. Try using household objects to create an obstacle course your child can run through. You can even make it a race! There are countless materials you can use to make a backyard obstacle course, but here are a few classics:

• Hula hoops placed on the ground for children to jump in
• Pool noodles to create hurdles
• Wooden planks your child can practice balancing on
• Laundry baskets and bean bags to throw in them
• A rotating sprinkler your child can run through

If you want to keep your obstacle course a permanent fixture in your backyard, try using more durable components like tires instead of hula hoops or PVC pipes for hurdles and tunnels. You could also try tying a strong rope to a tree branch for your child to climb or even purchase a rope wall you can place on a tree trunk or fence. These are just a few examples, but the sky is the limit! Not only are obstacle courses fun summer activities, but they also help exercise your child and even help them develop cognitive skills as they figure out different challenges. After all, just because it’s summer doesn’t mean your child has to stop learning.

Plant a Garden

Does your child love playing in the dirt? Good news: there are plenty of outdoor activities for preschoolers where they can do this in a controlled environment. For example, plant a small garden with your child in your front or backyard. You may even take them with you to buy plants to put in your new garden to make your little one feel even more included. Some easy summer plants for beginners include:

• Cherry tomatoes
• Cucumbers
• Marigolds
• Daylilies
• Cosmos

Once you get the seeds or plants home, you and your child can start digging up the designated area. Show your child how to plant a seed or full-grown plant and explain how often you’ll need to water it. You could even have your child paint some rocks and decorate the garden with these accents. Then for the rest of the summer, you have a little place you and your child can take care of and watch as your plants grow.

This isn’t just a fun activity to keep your little one entertained; it’s a great learning and developmental experience for children of all ages. Gardening gets your child outside and moving to plant, water, and care for your plants. Not to mention the experience teaches your child how to work with others in your family to make sure the garden is thriving. And when things don’t go quite as planned, gardening teaches your child problem-solving skills and resilience. An added bonus? Children are far more excited to try food they have helped grow themselves, so start that garden and get your child excited to eat their vegetables!

Hold a Scavenger Hunt

For children who love exploring, a scavenger hunt can be the perfect summer adventure. You can hold one at a park or even in your own backyard. Scavenger hunts are one of the most versatile outdoor activities for preschoolers. This activity can be as easy or as hard as you want it to be and last as long as you would like. Not to mention, they help your child use their brain in a new way and develop problem-solving skills as they try to find specific items. But first, you need to decide on a theme for your scavenger hunt. Here are a few popular ones:

Bug Hunt

Is your little one obsessed with bugs? Nurture their curiosity by holding a bug hunt in your backyard or at the park. Create a physical list of bugs your child can easily find in your area with words and pictures. Then give your child a magnifying glass and ask your child to draw the bugs they find next to their names on the list. If you want to make a keepsake, have your child place the bugs they find in a small container and create a bug board with them once you get home. Now your child can refer to real-life bugs when talking about them and always remember the fun time they had.

Plant Exploration

For children who love exploring the outdoors, give them a small notebook with a list of specific plants or plant parts for them to collect. This could ask them to find a rose or just find any kind of leaf. Then head outside and search for natural beauty. You may even save the leaves, petals, seeds, or branches you find in a sensory bin or a flower pressing book to preserve your child’s findings.

Pirate Adventure

Draw your child a map to find some buried treasure in your backyard or at a park. Make as many maps as you want and hide them in different locations. Once your child finds one, it should lead them to the next one and the next one until it reveals the ultimate reward. This reward could be toy gold coins, stickers, or another small token to get your child excited about exploring. Just remember to hide the items where your child can get them and make the clues simple enough for your child to understand. This could be a picture of the next location or a riddle they have to solve to find the next treasure.

Color Hunt

Children love colors, so why not challenge them to find specific colors as part of a scavenger hunt? Gather your crayons and have them check off the colors they find with that same color. Challenge them to create a rainbow from the colors in your own backyard, house, or even park.

Indoor Scavenger Hunt

If it’s not possible to hold a scavenger hunt outside, you can also hold one in the comfort of your home. Make a list of things for your child to find in your house and watch them take off. This list could be as specific as “find your favorite stuffed animal” or generic as “find something with buttons.” The point is to get your child thinking and moving to exercise their mind and body.

Trip Scavenger Hunt

Scavenger hunts don’t just have to happen at home or locally; you can do them on a family vacation to help keep your child engaged and occupied. Create a list of things for your child to find on a trip out of town. These items could include a family member’s house, a famous landmark, a specific type of food, or something else entirely.

Make Food Together

During the summer, you aren’t just trying to keep your child entertained; you are also trying to keep them well-nourished. But that doesn’t mean they can’t have a sweet treat every once in a while. Whether it’s time for dinner or a special snack, you can easily turn mealtime into a fun experience.

Dinner

Depending on how old your child is, ask them to help you make dinner. This could include showing them how to measure ingredients and then letting them do so on their own, or teaching them how to crack an egg. When you ask your child to help you, this gives them a sense of accomplishment and may even get them excited to try a new meal if they helped prepare it.

Ice Cream in a Bag

After playing outside in the heat, your child is sure to want something to cool them down. Water should always be the first priority, but you can also make some sweet treats to help beat the heat. All you need is milk, vanilla, sugar, salt, ice, and some Ziploc bags. There are various recipes for ice cream in a bag, and you can add extra goodies like chocolate syrup or gummy bears. But the real fun isn’t the sweet treat; it’s making the ice cream together.

After combining the milk, vanilla, and sugar in one bag and placing it in a larger bag with ice and salt, give the sealed bags to your child to shake for about six minutes. Play some fun music and shake your bags until the timer goes off. Then you can open the bag, mix the ice cream, add toppings, and enjoy a cold treat you made together!

Muffins

Get your child even more involved in measuring and combining ingredients by baking muffins together. There are countless recipes you can try, and it won’t be long before your child is eager to help make new delicious treats with you. Not to mention, baking teaches basic chemistry to children and shows them how different substances interact and are affected by heat. It’s a fun and educational activity that the whole family can do together.

Create Fun Crafts

Making your child’s summer memorable doesn’t have to be complicated. In fact, sometimes the most fun summer activities are the seemingly simplest ones you and your child did together. Arts and crafts, for example, can be a great way to connect with your little one and have a fun time making something new. Here are our top three crafts you can do at home that your child will remember forever:

Personalized Picture Frame

Do you have a photo that’s missing a frame? Grab your art supplies and work with your child to make a one-of-a-kind picture frame. You can purchase a plain wooden frame and then give your child paint, stickers, pom poms, glitter, glue, and more. Let their imagination run wild! This will create a brand-new picture frame they can display their favorite photos in. And now, whenever they see the frame, they will remember the day they worked with you to build it.

Paper Bag Kite

Arts and crafts don’t just have to sit around after you make them; some are even made to be used! For those windy summer days, instead of buying your child a kite, help them make their very own. You’ll need a paper lunch bag, yarn or strong twine, a popsicle stick, scissors, streamers, tape, and whatever your child wants to decorate the kite with. Start by having your child decorate the paper bag, then cut a hole on the bottom of the bag for the kite’s string to go through. Cut the string to be about 18-24 inches long and tie one end to the middle of the popsicle stick and feed it through the hole in the bag. Then you can tape streamers to the end of the paper bag, and you’re ready to take it out for a spin.

Oobleck

One fun creation you can make with your child is the strange substance Dr. Seuss called “Oobleck.” This is a fun, simple, and safe craft you can do with your child that will have you both entertained. Oobleck is a substance that acts like a liquid and a solid depending on how much pressure is being applied to it. All you need to make Oobleck is:

• 2 cups cornstarch
• 1 cup water
• Food coloring
• A mixing bowl

Add cornstarch to your mixing bowl followed by water colored with food dye. Do this a little bit at a time and mix together with a spoon. You’ll start to notice the mixture changing between a solid and a liquid, which is when it’s time to knead it with your hands and start having fun! Family friendly activities like these can blow your child’s mind and be a great science experiment to teach your child about solids and liquids (If you’re looking for more fun activities like this, you can find them here).

Go Camping

Sometimes, a simple adventure is the key to making your child’s summer memorable. This is what makes camping one of the most memorable family-friendly activities you can share with your child during the summer. It’s a chance to experience nature together and step away from the modern world while challenging both you and your child to adapt.

You don’t have to travel far when you go camping. In fact, you can go camping right in your backyard or at a nearby campground. Either way, you and your child will then work together to set up a tent, gather sticks for a fire, and prepare simple meals. Camping also creates natural opportunities for outdoor activities for preschoolers such as exploring trails, looking for bugs, collecting rocks, or watching the stars come out at night. These small moments help build your child’s curiosity and confidence as they engage with the world around them.

Make Chores Fun

No matter what time of year it is, giving your child age-appropriate chores can help teach your young one responsibility and develop skills they will use for the rest of their lives. Age-appropriate chores can even make your child feel accomplished, especially younger children who want to help their parents. But it isn’t uncommon for children to resist doing chores. After all, they aren’t nearly as fun as some of the other family-friendly activities on this list. But they can be with the following tips:

Use a Point System

One way to encourage your child to do their chores is by assigning a certain number of points to each activity. For example, making their bed might be one point while washing dishes might be three. Assign specific values to each chore and create a chart where you can keep track of how many points your child has obtained. The idea is that your child can exchange these points for a reward at the end of the week, month, or whatever timeline you give them. Just be clear what their possible rewards are. Fewer points should equal smaller rewards like stickers while more points could get them a reward like a trip to the ice cream shop. A points system gives them something to work towards when they’re doing age-appropriate chores.

Make Chores a Game

Chores don’t have to be boring. In fact, they can even be turned into fun games with a little creativity. For example:

• Play basketball by throwing dirty clothes in a laundry hamper
• Play broom hockey by making the dustpan the goal your child needs to sweep dirt into
• Shout out a color and have your child put away anything of that color in their playroom
• Race against your child or have siblings compete to finish a chore, just be sure they understand that they have to do the chore fully to win

When chores become a game, your child is more likely to have fun and be more eager to help you keep the house clean in the future.

Use Music as Motivation

Sometimes all it takes to get your child moving is a little music. If they’re resisting doing chores, try playing their favorite music while they work. This can quickly turn a boring chore into a dance party. You can even make up a cleaning song the two of you can sing together while doing chores.

Go to Summer Camp

Sometimes parents need help entertaining their children during the summer. After all, just because your kids aren’t in school doesn’t mean you get a break from work. Summer camp can be a great way to provide your child with fun summer activities in a safe environment while also giving you the time you need to work. Our summer camp program takes kids ages 5 to 12 and includes tons of family friendly activities like field trips to roller rinks, bowling alleys, museums, and more. Not only will your child have fun, but they’ll also get a chance to continue learning and make friends even when school isn’t in session.

Looking for More Fun Activities to Do with Your Child?

Finding fun family activities to do with your child is a great way to bond with your little one. Not to mention, these activities can exercise their brains and bodies, helping them grow. Sign up for our newsletter to get more activity ideas you can do with your child no matter what time of year it is.

Fun Summer Activities Frequently Asked Questions